ELLE interview: Kirsty Godso, Nike

With the epic five-hour fitness festival Nike+ Training Club (N+TC) Tour fast approaching, Nike trainer Kirsty Godso chats to ELLE about her top training tips, how to fuel your body and mind for the big day plus why she’ll never workout for a #thighgap. Let the countdown to 2 May begin.

ELLE: The Nike+ Training Club NTC Tour is just around the corner taking place on 2nd May. How should girls be prepping for it?

Kirsty: My advice to people is that the worst thing you can do is go in really hot. We've designed an eight-week training program that is perfectly structured to have enough challenge in it for someone that is exercising regularly, but also to caters to a beginner. The program includes various workouts from the Nike Training Club app and different distances of runs, so you can scale according to your level.

It's all about getting moving and instilling confidence week by week and then over the schedule the intensity does start to ramp up.

ELLE: Let's talk nutrition. How should people be looking at their diet and nutrition in the lead up to the Tour? And what is the best way to manage an increased appetite from training.

K: Nutrition is different for everyone, so it will vary. However, once people start training more regularly, and get their body into those routines, they will start to figure it out. Girls will find that their cravings for foods will change and they'll be hunting down foods that are really going to fuel their body.

I always recommend keeping little snack packs with you to keep on standby for moments you don't have time for proper meal. Fuelling your body with nutritionally-dense foods like raw nuts, fruit and protein powder, which you can mix with water at any time, will keep your energy levels up and stop you from sabotaging your program with unhealthy options.

ELLE: For you personally, what is your routine like?

K: It's always changing but for example today, I worked out early at five am, so thirty minues before that I had half a scoop of protein powder with water. Straight after my workout I had a protein shake, because I knew that I was going to participate in one of the NTC sessions and then I went and had a good breakfast of eggs, avocado and spinach.

ELLE: Are there any other tips you have for getting the most out of your workout?

K: Hydration is a really important one. It's one of those things that you hate to be told, like drink more water, drink more water. I promise you once you start increasing your training, your natural water intake is just going to improve, which is so great for your skin.

Training tips would be take on the challenge. When you really want to stop and you think you need to take a break, get in two more repetitions, and then take a break, because that's all going to add up at the end of the day.

The other thing is variety, just keeping it fun. Even if you're using the Nike Training Club app, there are so many different workouts on there that you can do, because you don't want to get bored so your training should always be fun.

ELLE: Is there anything in particular you do for yourself that you love, or for when you want to see some results quickly?

K: My absolute go to favourite way to train is high intensity interval training. I'll either do that on my own or I'll do one of the workouts from the app. Tabata is my favourite thing in the world, so even if I'm in a hotel room, I'll pick like a couple of moves and I'll bang them out in my hotel room, you can really mix it up that way.

ELLE: How about after the Tour? How should girls keep from plateauing fitness-wise?

K: I would say they should anticipate the next challenge we're going to throw at them. It's never going to stop, you should aim to feel great all year round! You're never going to hear me talk about training for a thigh gap or training for a bikini, or training for summer, because I think we should feel sexy in winter, and I think we should just feel good all year round. I think once the tour has ended, I'll be pushing out a lot more challenges to girls to really keep them in the zone.

It's a process, and you have to really appreciate that your body is an amazing thing. You have to work hard and it's not going to happen overnight, but it is going to happen, and you've got to commit to it.

ELLE interview: Kirsty Godso, Nike

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